Nintendo announce: Nintendo NX

[Deleted member 13524]

Looking at the Tegra thread it looks like there is starting to appear some general disbelief that the eurogamer's rumors are true and that there's no tegra and it's not just a handheld.

For example, Just Dance 17 has been announced for the NX. Does it make any sense that a Just Dance game would be on a handheld?
There's also the fact that Nintendo has posted job applications for Console and Portable marketing leads, which would bring us back to the original handheld + dock rumor and not just a handheld.
And then it seems that several gaming websites got eurogamer's Tegra rumors, but none of them decided to go through with the story because they couldn't get more than a 2nd-hand source... so they all just posted it as a rumor with eurogamer as a source.

Well, the density improvements aren't significant between the two nodes, so there's only so much they can fit reasonably.

Perhaps doubling bandwidth + compression improvements should still see a decent boost.

Here is a TX1 compared to a TX2. It seems the board size is about the same, but even if you compare with the DRAMs you'll notice the new chip is a bit larger:

Then again, the first Denver cores were huge and probably so should be the new ones. It's possible they dedicated the larger die area mostly for the two additional LPDDR4 channels and the Denver cores.

But perhaps this is a discussion for the Tegra thread.

Nvidia has pretty much stopped tegra development it seems.

Well getting the Denver2 cores in there, implementing full HMP with the Denver and A57 cores, doubling bandwidth to quad-channel LPDDR4 and transitioning to 16FF+ certainly didn't come effortless or free..

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Upon further investigation on Rootax's post on the Tegra thread, it seems that DMP has recently announced a new family of GPUs called M3000 that can be set up between 1 and 4 shader clusters. They say it can be a "TFLOP-class GPU", so the 4 cluster version (M3400) would at least be 1 TFLOPs.

The press release claims the GPU architecture will be in shipping SoCs during H1 2017 (though I think I saw Q1 2017 somewhere else).
Some japanese industry commenters are saying the Tegra rumor appeared because earlier devkits were using a Tegra X1 together with a Xilinx FPGA in order to emulate the performance of the NX chip with a DMP GPU.

They seem to make a big deal about the new GPU supporting Vulkan, of which Nintendo makes part as a contributor since late last year.

 

[RDGoodla]

Upon further investigation on Rootax's post on the Tegra thread, it seems that DMP has recently announced a new family of GPUs called M3000 that can be set up between 1 and 4 shader clusters.

.
Some japanese industry commenters are saying the Tegra rumor appeared because earlier devkits were using a Tegra X1 together with a Xilinx FPGA in order to emulate the performance of the NX chip with a DMP GPU.

Which Japanese commenters? I only saw youtuber claimed DMP handheld & AMD home console.

 

[Rangers]

For example, Just Dance 17 has been announced for the NX. Does it make any sense that a Just Dance game would be on a handheld?

Err, it's a handheld that doubles as a home console as well. What's the issue?

 

[Silent_Buddha]

I am not sure how Nvidia work this out because they also use ISPs-DSPs for part of the image classification and not just traditional GPU cores.
But this is Nvidia so I do not equate their figures to that of literally

To emphasise why I feel the discrete GPU is critical in the next gen Tegra design here is an important figure that I added as an edit earlier but will be missed by some as it was so late.
The Drive PX has 2.3 Teraflops of performance with its dual TX1 processors.
The Drive PX2 has 2.5 Teraflops of performance with its dual next gen Tegra processors.

That is not much of an improvement if one also does not consider that latest next gen Tegra Drive PX2 is designed around discrete GPUs.
Cheers

That's all well and good, however, the NX is a handheld. How do you propose they power all of this in a handheld and still offer multiple hours of battery life in a device that isn't inordinately heavy?

Regards,
SB

 

[BRiT]

That's all well and good, however, the NX is a handheld. How do you propose they power all of this in a handheld and still offer multiple hours of battery life in a device that isn't inordinately heavy?

Wireless power. Duh.

 

[CSI PC]

That's all well and good, however, the NX is a handheld. How do you propose they power all of this in a handheld and still offer multiple hours of battery life in a device that isn't inordinately heavy?

Regards,
SB

It is meant to be a hybrid console and not just handheld.
The post of mine you are quoting shows that the Tegra 'X2' only has the same performance as the Tegra X1 unless you also include the GP107 GPUs (an assumption when looking at the TFlops compared to 1060) that are used by the Drive PX2.
So it is just as difficult to explain how a Tegra X2 without discrete low powered mobile GPU is going to be used as a hybrid design when it has minimal performance benefits over X1.
Its performance would only be competitive to that of next gen mobile phones, how much so would need to be seen and a handheld console needs to be able to differentiate itself from good 'game' mobile phones with better performance and game design.

To answer your question what would be the criteria spec for a next gen handheld for game time battery life without recharging when mobile and 'GPU focused' power draw allowed in watts?
You seen how long a smart phone lasts while playing Pokemon Go that is incredibly popular?
This can be from 2hrs to 3 hrs maximum without changing settings, and doing so (that includes turning off sound) only increases that to a maximum of 5 hrs.
I know this from experience and friends with kids and also articles, anyway even with a seriously reduced game time available between mains recharging it is an incredibly popular game.
Cheers

 

[Rootax]

That's all well and good, however, the NX is a handheld. How do you propose they power all of this in a handheld and still offer multiple hours of battery life in a device that isn't inordinately heavy?

Regards,
SB

Not every one agree with that. I believe NX will be a "family" of consoles, one handheld and one home console. handheld only or hybrid make no sense.

 

[Rootax]

It is meant to be a hybrid console and not just handheld.
...
Cheers

Again, it's more and more debatable. Eurogamer have been wrong before, hell they even announced nVidia for the 3DS at the time, so... One handheld, one home console, with a somewhat close dev environnement so games can be ported pretty easily is what I believe in, with all the rumors floating around. Hell, that's even what Nintendo talked about 1-2 years ago, before Iwata's death.

 

[Clukos]

Hopefully what's being used in NX, but i haven't been following NX news or "Parker" potential pricing so these are only my hopes

 

[CSI PC]

Again, it's more and more debatable. Eurogamer have been wrong before, hell they even announced nVidia for the 3DS at the time, so... One handheld, one home console, with a somewhat close dev environnement so games can be ported pretty easily is what I believe in, with all the rumors floating around. Hell, that's even what Nintendo talked about 1-2 years ago, before Iwata's death.

I never went by Eurogamer myself for these rumours.
I was thinking more of Emily Rogers who mentioned her sources back in early May way before anyone else, and reinforced along with the cancellation of Nvidia's own patented handheld (pointless to do if they have the contract for a hybrid).

Of course this is still speculation whether for/against, just that this time Emily was way ahead of the rumours and received her information from multiple sources.
Also there is the timeframe for the release of the NX, logically if going AMD there is no reason for it to be delayed so long, further emphasised that the Shield services such as Nividia's Grid/cloud gaming makes great sense for Nintendo to differentiate itself more from AMD/Sony.
But there is the consideration as ToTTenTranz says it does not need to be either AMD/Nvidia, although that leaves too much work for Nintendo to do IMO and some of those technologies seem to be just a bit too late.

Cheers

 

[RDGoodla]

Again, it's more and more debatable. Eurogamer have been wrong before, hell they even announced nVidia for the 3DS at the time, so... One handheld, one home console, with a somewhat close dev environnement so games can be ported pretty easily is what I believe in, with all the rumors floating around. Hell, that's even what Nintendo talked about 1-2 years ago, before Iwata's death.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2016/07...d-console-with-tv-dock-less-powerful-than-ps4

ign also verified the information of eurogamer.


And I have to say the rumor of "DMP handheld + AMD home console" (from a youtuber) is not a very good idea of unifying development resource, which is Nintendo's long-term vision.

 

[CSI PC]

There was also Segmentnext who said the Eurogamer information was slightly wrong and the released product will be based upon Tegra X2 according to sources close to the project (yeah pinch of salt time but it fits with what Emily Rogers also mentions ).
http://segmentnext.com/2016/08/17/report-nintendo-nx-is-using-tegra-x2-chip-more-powerful-than-x1/

Cheers

 

[liolio]

Verified... they rehacked through Eurogamer claims from what I read.

As for Parker it seems to be a mismatch for Nintendo needs as CPU performances is a strong point of the SOC (2 super + 4 big cores).
If Nintendo really uses a Nvidia OC it has to be custom (and I suspect it is a more cost sensitive design than both Parker and Tegra X1).
It seems people are getting way too enthusiastic, it happens all the time with N hardware and people set themselves for disappointment.
I suspect a 64 bit bus and I suspect N will have avoided a heterogeneous CPU set-up.

I've seen nothing going on at Nintendo headquarter that leads me to believe that the company would have changed its approach of the business. Expecting a jump from the new 3DS and the Wii U to a high end system is desillusional... sadly.

Nintendo needs to: keep doing its stuff, undercut its competitors, and lower their costs significantly. We have yet to hear about a significant reorg of their game division, business as usual

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Two things to consider about the new DMP GPUs:

- Besides unified shaders with OpenCL 1.2 compute and Vulkan 1.0 support, they are also supporting the PICA200's proprietary MAESTRO instructions in the hardware, which would make it possible to natively run 3DS games (which are still selling rather well worldwide) at a very low power consumption.

- Nintendo has developed at least 2 distinct SoCs with a DMP GPU during the last ~8 years.

Err, it's a handheld that doubles as a home console as well. What's the issue?

And you'll have to set up a webcam next to a TV while wired to a handheld? Even if you can detach the controllers from the handheld and put it next to the TV, would it be convenient to plug the console into a wired webcam in addition to a hdmi cable + power cable every time you wanted to play a certain game genre? "Game X only works in home console mode"? It doesn't sound very consumer-friendly.
It's bound to generate a huge confusion among casuals (which will definitely be a good chunk of Nintendo's target audience).
If it's a hybrid console, then all games for the NX should require support for both modes.

I was thinking more of Emily Rogers who mentioned her sources back in early May way before anyone else,

Emily Rogers' blog post from May only says the console isn't using x86 and its processing power is below (but close-ish to) the Xbone. There's no actual mention of the CPU/GPU/SoC supplier.
nvidia not selling a follow-up to the Shield Tablet makes sense because the TX1 is more expensive and power-hungry than TK1 in the shield tablet. The latter has been selling for rather low margins - $200 as of now despite low production volume, 1080p IPS screen, dual high-quality speakers, walcom digitizer, and other stuff. The only TX1 in a handheld device is going into the very expensive and large Pixel C1.
And then TX2 seems to be exclusively developed for automotive applications, which means there's no more Tegra development for consumer handhelds as hinted by Jen Hsun Huang before.

After Eurogamer's article about the NX + Tegra, people started to associate the lack of a Shield Tablet successor to nvidia's commitment to the new console. However, the most logical explanation is that the Tegra division hasn't been getting very successful in getting design wins for consumer handhelds ever since Tegra 3, so nvidia shifted its focus for the automotive market. Another proof of that is how TX2 came up to be much more CPU-centric and the GPU seems to be pretty much the same as the TX1 (the latest slides don't even dare to put up any iGPU comparisons).

Which Japanese commenters? I only saw youtuber claimed DMP handheld & AMD home console.

The youtuber took the DMP GPU for NX idea from the japanese articles and some posts on social networks from japanese industry commenters.
I know these info bites aren't as solid for us westerners as the eurogamer rumors, but eurogamer has been wrong before, especially regarding Nintendo's consoles.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2016/07...d-console-with-tv-dock-less-powerful-than-ps4
ign also verified the information of eurogamer.

IGN only verified the parts about the detachable controllers from the tablet. The idea that it's only one device (no dock and/or no home console) and the info about nvidia providing the SoC for the final hardware is coming exclusively from Eurogamer, who also got that last part wrong for the 3DS is the past:

This Engadget post effectively sums up most of the rumours associating Nintendo with NVIDIA's low-power mobile Tegra 2 chipset, while Eurogamer itself has been privy to some startling information on the technological make-up of the successor to the Sony PSP and its Go sibling, now being developed by the platform holder in association with its chosen third-party partners.

Speaking under conditions of anonymity, further credible sources from within the mobile graphics industry have provided Digital Foundry with further background detail on the raw technical capabilities of the new hardware. These sources, intimately involved with the alliances and deal-making within their sector, effectively confirm the reported allegiances between Nintendo/NVIDIA and Sony/IMG, but also provide a fascinating insight into the kinds of devices the new handhelds will be, and the power levels we can expect.

 

[CSI PC]

T


Emily Rogers' blog post from May only says the console isn't using x86 and its processing power is below (but close-ish to) the Xbone. There's no actual mention of the CPU/GPU/SoC supplier.
nvidia not selling a follow-up to the Shield Tablet makes sense because the TX1 is more expensive and power-hungry than TK1 in the shield tablet. The latter has been selling for rather low margins - $200 as of now despite low production volume, 1080p IPS screen, dual high-quality speakers, walcom digitizer, and other stuff. The only TX1 in a handheld device is going into the very expensive and large Pixel C1.
And then TX2 seems to be exclusively developed for automotive applications, which means there's no more Tegra development for consumer handhelds as hinted by Jen Hsun Huang before.

After Eurogamer's article about the NX + Tegra, people started to associate the lack of a Shield Tablet successor to nvidia's commitment to the new console. However, the most logical explanation is that the Tegra division hasn't been getting very successful in getting design wins for consumer handhelds ever since Tegra 3, so nvidia shifted its focus for the automotive market. Another proof of that is how TX2 came up to be much more CPU-centric and the GPU seems to be pretty much the same as the TX1 (the latest slides don't even dare to put up any iGPU comparisons).



The youtuber took the DMP GPU for NX idea from the japanese articles and some posts on social networks from japanese industry commenters.
I know these info bites aren't as solid for us westerners as the eurogamer rumors, but eurogamer has been wrong before, especially regarding Nintendo's consoles.


IGN only verified the parts about the detachable controllers from the tablet. The idea that it's only one device (no dock and/or no home console) and the info about nvidia providing the SoC for the final hardware is coming exclusively from Eurogamer, who also got that last part wrong for the 3DS is the past:

This is what Emily Rogers said back then@

After speaking to seven different people this week, I can say with confidence that this is false. NX is not using x86 architecture like PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. The NX has special, custom-made chips and the overall design of the hardware is very modern. The chips are industry leading because they are very modern chips, but having modern chips doesn’t necessarily mean Nintendo is aiming to create the most powerful hardware on the market. Furthermore, any NX rumors on “Polaris chips” and “Polaris architecture” are all wacky. There’s a good reason why those rumors are wacky.

In terms of raw power, numerous sources tell me that NX is much closer to Xbox One than PlayStation 4. Even that might be stretching it a tiny bit. Anyone who is claiming that NX is “two times the power of PS4 GPU” is being misled by their sources. Based on what I’ve heard, I don’t believe the NX will compete directly with PS4 (Neo) / PS4K in raw power.

There will be plenty of debates over the NX’s specs because it’s not simple to directly compare two apples (with x86 architecture) to an orange (that doesn’t use x86 architecture). But everything that I’ve heard (so far) indicates that NX isn’t going to blow away any of the consoles on the market today…except for Wii U.

If going by what Emily says it is not AMD, it is very modern and the chips are industry leading (that means AMD/Nvidia/ARM) now in the context of what the hybrid NX is meant to be.
She also has since mentioned (separately to the above) that it sounds like the design is not that cheap with the information she has from her own sources.
The only chips fitting all of those parameters to date are the Tegra/ARM setup, with many sources pointing to this as well, while there is only one for the DMP GPU that is different to the Tegra design.
It is much less likely that Nintendo would contract with Nvidia to use the Tegra X1 development system as a developer-emulation box in preparation for the DMP GPU, that is a lot of hoops to go through and does not help developers who need to start working on some of the games now.

If it is the DMP3000 good call, but back in May the only hardware shown to public was Tegra X2 and we are talking many rumour sources for the Tegra against one article for the DMP3000 series.

Also you mention they are backing out of console, but that is not true when one looks at the continued development Nvidia puts into the Grid service and the Shield TV console was their only gaming product they upgraded to the Tegra X1.
By that logic they should had given up when it was the K1 and not spent resources developing Grid.
There is a big opportunity for Grid in the future to work with a next generation of the Shield TV console that could be implemented in other entertainment solutions.

Edit:
Also seems the DMP 3000 series is 28nm.
Cheers

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Even if you can detach the controllers from the handheld and put it next to the TV, would it be convenient to plug the console into a wired webcam in addition to a hdmi cable + power cable every time you wanted to play a certain game genre?

I'd assume the device has a forward facing camera. In the dock, the device camera will work for camera-input. The dock should also be permanently attached, so you just slip the NX in to play console mode.

"Game X only works in home console mode"? It doesn't sound very consumer-friendly.
It's bound to generate a huge confusion among casuals (which will definitely be a good chunk of Nintendo's target audience).

Just Dance could still run in handheld mode, but it'd be obviously unusable. Who'd buy Just Dance expecting to play a handheld game?! I don't think any real confusion would be generated. 99% of titles will be controller based and running the same on TV and unit.

 

[CSI PC]

Well looking more at the DMP M3000 series its performance is between 200-800GFLOPS according to some Japanese reports, the DMP site mentions vaguely a Teraflop but it seems a little less by some articles for the maximum configuration, and the maximum configuration is 4 clusters rather than 1, and is 28nm.
http://www.jinri-toutiao.com/id/582801.html
This looks like it will be weaker than the next gen mobile phones/tablets.

Cheers

 

[Deleted member 13524]

If going by what Emily says it is not AMD, it is very modern and the chips are industry leading now in the context of what the hybrid NX is meant to be.

Emily says it's not x86 (which does not put aside AMD because they could technically do an ARM+GCN custom design, although not likely to happen) and the Polaris comment is definitely referring to Polaris 10 alone because she claimed it wouldn't go on par with the PS4 Neo. That's not to say a GCN4 chip (e.g. low-clocked Polaris 11 equivalent) couldn't find its way into a tablet.

She also has since mentioned (separately to the above) that it sounds like the design is not that cheap with the information she has from her own sources.
The only chips fitting all of those parameters to date are the Tegra/ARM setup

Nah, almost any SoC maker could develop a not cheap design using a recent CPU IP from ARM and a recent modular iGPU IP from ARM, IMGtec, Vivante, AMD, DMP and others.
Samsung, Hisilicon, Renesas, Marvell, AMlogic, Mediatek, etc. and even Nintendo alone (see 3DS + New 3DS) could build a SoC that way.
Even IMGtec could develop a MIPS + PowerVR solution that could fit Emily Rogers' description of modern non-x86 SoC.

the Tegra/ARM setup, with many sources pointing to this as well

(...)we are talking many rumour sources for the Tegra

How many? Aside from forum talk, where are the "many" sources claiming the NX will be powered by a Tegra SoC? All I see is a single source - eurogamer - whose sources have a history of being wrong regarding nintendo handheld designs. All other articles in the web are simply pointing to eurogamer. Many got the same tip beforehand but decided not to run with it because it was always second-hand information.
Eurogamer decided to run with it so if it turns out false, it's only eurogamer who's at fault.

Also you mention they are backing out of console, but that is not true when one looks at the continued development Nvidia puts into the Grid service and the Shield TV console was their only gaming product they upgraded to the Tegra X1.
(...)
By that logic they should had given up when it was the K1 and not spent resources developing Grid.

Backing out of console? I said (because nvidia said) they're backing out of consumer handheld devices. GRID is a cloud service and the Shield TV is a set-top-box. None of them are handhelds. There is only one handheld product in the whole world using a TX1, which is the Pixel C1. The decision to back out of consumer handhelds came out after the TX1 was put into the market.

Well looking more at the DMP M3000 series its performance is between 200-800GFLOPS according to some Japanese reports, the DMP site mentions vaguely a Teraflop but it seems a little less by some articles for the maximum configuration, and the maximum configuration is 4 clusters rather than 1, and is 28nm.
http://wiiu.tgbus.com/news/201608/20160811183758.shtml Moe edit: ノット・セーフ・フォー・ワーク
This looks like it will be weaker than the next gen mobile phones/tablets.

800 GFLOPs would actually be spectacular for a handheld.
Though I'm not sure how much I would trust a website that has porn picture links in the right row . They're the only ones who've mentioned 200 GFLOPs/cluster and 28nm.

(we should get a NSFW tag to that site BTW)

 

[Wynix]

Yeah need a NSFW tag on that, very distracting and stops people from working.

I hope it's not DMP, as that will completely sink my desire for the device.